This concept of having a guest in the class, who was a key actor in the case being discussed, changes the dynamics of how the discussion in the class proceeds. Almost in all these cases, there are more questions than time available. The discussions and Q&A sessions in most cases extend into the coffee break - which is good. Today we had a guest from FBI - since we were discussing the transformation of FBI post 9/11.
The FBI case is a complicated one, because of the the basic organizational structure of the different governmental agencies charted with security and counter intelligence. There were many who strongly believed that the FBI is a law enforcement agency dedicated to arresting, prosecuting and convicting people who break the law. While they are damn good at it, law enforcement is not intelligence. A criminal case is all about finding out what happened, whereas an intelligence case is all about figuring out "what is going to happen, when and where". FBI was not set up to do this from multiple angles - people, skills, processes, policies, training and leadership. In hindsight, it was obvious that there were many disparate incidents which the agencies (FBI, CIA, INS, NSA) involved missed - they did not connect the dots and the information was not shared across agencies. The criticism against FBI was centered around two incidents - The Phoenix Memo and the CIA data on two of the terrorists.
However changing organizational culture is easier said than done. In fact the FBI director at that time had just taken over on Sept 4, 2001. Post 9/11, he was waging two wars at the same time: one against the terrorism and one against his own bureaucracy. He made a series of changes, all interlinked:
- He setup a new set of 10 priorities, the first being " prevent the USA from terrorist attack"
- Message sent out to all agents was, " Prevent first and prosecute second"
- With the help of changes in the law (thru the Patriotic Act), the barriers to sharing information were broken down; here again the message was, share by default and withhold by exception
- Set up an office of intelligence to enhance analytical capabilities
- Focus on training shifted to counter-terrorism and counter-intelligence; sent senior leaders to business schools to learn about change management
- Concerted efforts to put in place systems and processes : Balanced Scorecard, Strategic execution team (revamped metrics, reward systems and HR policies) and Structured review systems
What are the learning's ? Changes in strategy will not take effect, unless they are rooted in appropriate changes in organization structures; role of senior leadership is always crucial in shaping such punctuated changes. Culture and history will be constraints; We had the FBI regional director of the Boston region with us in class to answer questions. The biggest decision was whether to keep law enforcement and domestic intelligence as one organization or split them into two. And the decision was to integrate and enable collaboration with other agencies. The fact that there has been no terrorist attack in the US is proof that this was the right decision. But in hindsight !
The second case was whether Microsoft should acquire Intuit - and the year was 1994. Through this case, there were many points which were conveyed. Even the rich have problems - look at Microsoft:
- At that time they had $3.6b in cash; because of which the ROE was 35%; if we exclude cash, then the ROE was 103%
- What options were available for Microsoft to reduce cash : Pay dividend, acquisitions, get into new business internally or buyback shares; lets look at each of these:
- In the US dividends were taxed at 40% and capital gains were taxed at 25%; Obviously Bill Gates would prefer capital gains and hence dividend was not a favourable option to the largest shareholders
- Microsoft made public statements that its stock was overvalued; since they strongly believed in it, it made sense to do any acquisition with stocks; so using cash to buy is ruled out
- Internal business was already being done; so spending more did not make sense
- That leaves the last option of buyback of shares; if the shares are overvalued, any buy back is a disaster for the remaining shareholders - and who are they - it is Bill Gates and his executives; hence it does not make sense to buyback !
- With no option to use the cash, it piled up fro $3.6b in 1994 to $72b in 2004
- When the tax laws changed in 2003, to tax capital gains and dividend at 15%, Microsoft started paying dividends
Anyway to complete the story, Microsoft did not buy Intuit.
The last case was a discussion on Nigeria. The key take ways for me was the concept of a "Dutch Disease" and "rentier state".
The term Dutch Disease was coined by The Economist in 1977 to describe the decline in the manufacturing sector following the discovery of large oil fields in the Netherlands. The basic concept is as follows: if a country increases its revenues from natural resources, that makes the nation's currency stronger, making the manufacturing sector uncompetitive. As is obvious, this affects countries which are endowed with abundant natural resources - read as oil ! Nigeria, has more oil reserves than Mexico and has exploited it fully, at the cost of all other industries including manufacturing. For more on this see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_disease
Similarly, a "rentier state" is the term used to classify countries which derive all or a substantial portion of their national revenues from "renting" their natural resources to external clients to exploit. In the case of Nigeria, the bulk of the government revenues did not depend on any economic activity in the country - it was called a rentier state. See Wikipeida for more details on this : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rentier_state
Classes ended by afternoon and hence I spent time in the Gym today. And we had a rotational dinner today and met with some new folks today. And we discussed many topics across countries over wine and dinner.
More later ...
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